Critically Endangered
Philippine forest turtle
Siebenrockiella leytensis
Philippine forest turtle is a freshwater turtle endemic to the Philippines.
Appearance
Philippine forest turtles have brown to reddish brown to black carapaces that reach a length of 21 cm (8.3 in). A dorsal ridge (the keel) is only present in the posterior vertebral scutes or absent altogether. The plastron is reddish brown to black, sometimes with blotches of yellow.
Larger individuals can reach 30 cm (12 in) in length, though this is relatively rare.
Range and habitat
Philippine forest turtles are known only from northern Palawan and surrounding islands. This includes the island of Dumaran where the species is still relatively abundant in creeks. Philippine forest turtle is a freshwater turtle endemic to the Philippines.
Despite the latter common name, it does not occur in the island of Leyte but is instead native to the Palawan island group. The entirety of the Palawan group of islands is also a nationally protected area.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
Like most turtles, their sexual maturation is delayed but they are able to mate multiple times before death (iteroparity). Observations indicate that they are omnivorous, favouring commercial turtle food, aquatic plants and they have been observed hunting small fish and crustaceans.
In crisis
It is classified as critically endangered. Due to the previous inability to locate it in the wild, probable threats from habitat loss, and potential pressure from collectors, this turtle is listed as critically endangered. Due to the susceptibility of the species to stress and the extremely aggressive territorial behavior of male individuals, Philippine forest turtles do not do well in captivity.
Nevertheless, as of 2009, a considerable number of these turtles (over 171 individuals documented in a span of four years) were to be found for sale illegally in major Manila pet markets, particularly in the main Chinese markets (where the turtles are sold cheaper). Most of the individuals were juveniles or young adults.
CITES lists this taxon on Appendix II. Confirm the current appendix on the CITES checklist.
Philippine forest turtle is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Philippine forest turtle, Wikidata item Q2716647. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
